What you should know
- A Staten Island judge struck down New York City’s mask mandate for young children on Friday, calling it “arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable.”
- The mayor has been planning to make masks optional for children ages 2 to 4 starting Monday, which would mark exactly four weeks since he lifted the rule for vaccine-eligible schoolchildren in K-schools. 12.
- But things have changed since he announced that plan on March 22. Positivity rates and total cases are rising, with transmission rates in the city up 19% during that time. Mayor Eric Adams is expected to address the mandate on Friday afternoon.
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NEW YORK — A Staten Island judge struck down New York City’s mask mandate for young children on Friday, calling it “arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable.”
The mandate was due to expire on Monday, although Mayor Eric Adams will address the mandate on Friday afternoon.
The mayor has been planning to make masks optional for children ages 2 to 4 starting Monday, which would mark exactly four weeks since he lifted the rule for vaccine-eligible schoolchildren in K-schools. 12.
But things have changed since he announced that plan on March 22. Positivity rates and total cases are rising, with transmission rates in the city up 19% during that time.
The most critical metrics — hospitalizations and deaths — continue to decline, and officials have said they don’t expect another serious spike related to the BA.2 subvariant. That said, the city continues to err on the side of caution.
Right now, the citywide community COVID alert level is low, according to the new referral system Adams introduced. So far, the level of risk has not changed since the school mandate was lifted on March 7, which the mayor called a “great sign” as he declared it was time to “peel back another layer.”
Children under the age of 2 have not been subject to mask mandates since the pandemic began.
While BA.2 appears to be “inherently more transmissible” than the original Omicron strain, the World Health Organization has said, experts say they don’t expect it to trigger a resurgence given high vaccination rates and so many people who have recently been infected with the first Omicron strain.
BA.2 is now the dominant COVID strain in both New York and the United States. Earlier this week, the feds authorized a second booster dose for millions more Americans to help stem the potential wave of new infections among the most vulnerable.
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